CRIME AND FEAR: Evidence from Australia

• Published in: British journal of criminology 1997, Vol.37 (4), p.635-657
• Main Authors: BOROOAH, VANI K., CARCACH, CARLOS A.
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Analysis; Australia; Correlation coefficients; Crime; Crime fear; Crime victims; Crimes against the person; Criminal justice; Criminology; Fear; Fear of Crime; Housing; Offenses against property; Offenses against the person; Policing; Queensland; Risk; Rural areas; Statistics; Surveys; Urban crime; Victimization; Victims; Workforce
• ISSN: 0007-0955; 1464-3529
• DOI: 10.1093/oxfordjournals.bjc.a014202

This study, which is based on unit record data from the Queensland Crime Victim Survey of 1991, conducts, using a common set of explanatory variables, a joint analysis of the probabilities of becoming, and of being afraid of becoming, a victim of personal and of housing crime. It then proceeds to analyse the relationship between previous victimization experience and fear of crime (personal and housing). Its broad conclusion is that unlike personal crime, where reducing the fear of crime—over and above concern with reducing the incidence of crime—might be an important policy objective, the policy goal for housing crime should, primarily, be to reduce its incidence. This is because, for personal crime, variations in the probability of being afraid greatly exceeded variations in the risk of becoming a victim: fear of personal crime thus emerges as a problem in its own right. On the other hand, for housing crime, incidence is an accurate reflection of fear. It also concludes that lack of neighbourhood cohesion, neighbourhood incivility and perception of relatively high neighbourhood crime levels contribute significantly to the probability of being afraid of crime and to the risk of victimization. It suggests that, in policy terms, community action might be a more effective means of combating both crime and the fear of crime than a ‘leave it to the police, that's what they get paid for’ attitude.